Lithium battery systems have, for several years, represented an important, and commercially successful, energy storage and deployment medium. Magnesium battery systems have recently been under development, as potentially superior alternatives to lithium battery systems, due among other reasons to the inherently superior capacity of magnesium electrochemistry.
The development of optimal magnesium batteries carries certain challenges, however, such as the generally slow diffusion rates of Mg ions at the electrolyte interface with some typically employed electrodes. Prospects for producing competitive or superior magnesium batteries can potentially be increased by the incorporation of electrodes which utilize nanoparticulate metal as an electrochemically active material. To maximize the prospects for technological success and economic viability, it is desirable that such metal nanoparticles be obtainable through processes that are simple, easily scalable to industrial capacity, highly reproducible, and capable of producing metal nanoparticles of high purity (e.g. devoid of oxides and other undesirable contaminating species.